|
|
these past forty-eight hours have been most peculiar. like being on another planet, more correctly. granted, solitude isn't always the best situation. though i've done more than just hide in the house with a book and the cat. i drove back to C'ville to return the video, got into a lengthy conversation with an irish guy behind the counter (about british comedy and football), hunted down some tempura, fixed the roof and fought bees at my mother's house, made the pepper plants happy with another dose of stinky fertilizer, and returned to wash my clothes, dishes and and chill. and then i woke up. today, that is. it came upon me that i hadn't seen, nor talked, with anyone that knew me (or cared) by any other means than the phone, for days. not counting my wife, who i haven't heard from since saturday. what interaction i did have with the locals, the people who i've spent my life around, was either met with stares or them asking me to repeat myself... which i seem to do with alarming regularity. like i'm speaking in another tongue, or wasn't interesting enough to listen to the first time. how odd. i can converse with Africans, Hawaiians, Britons, Pakistanis and Irish, and am never asked to repeat... and they understand, and share a laugh or two. i pull over on a narrow side street in my hometown, and i watch the head of the driver i've just let through pivot around, with a constant stare and no other acknowlegement of my presence. almost hearing his mind say, "who the hayell is that SonOfaBitch?" I say, "hello, how ya doin' " to the baseball-capped guy that sells me the sunday paper and his eyes just glaze over. and says, "whut?" treated like a foreigner. communication, usually my strong suit, seems to be failing me miserably. it's one of those times where i think maybe i need to just back off, fade into the woodwork, camouflage myself into the background where i can just do what i need to do, and surface when the rest of the world can stomach me. or i can reciprocate. this is all probably temporary... and is probably my own problem. may be not, totally. i'll submerge into the car, in just a little while, and make the midnight ride back home. the cat will be there... my own, empty bed... and no need to speak. back to the island. |
|
|
